Each year, approximately 10,000 litres of cream and 28,000 kilos of strawberries are consumed at Wimbledon as Tennis fans gather to watch the matches in the summer months.
But if you aren't at Centre Court and instead are tuning in from the comfort of your own home, then you might be thinking of nipping to the shop to stock up on the sweet treat for yourself.
Before you head out to the supermarket though, here's a little bit of food for thought.
We put five major supermarkets to the test to see which one had the best strawberries and cream of the lot, purchasing the combo from Tesco, Asda, Lidl, Sainsbury's, and M&S.
Here's how they fared...
Lidl
Strawberries punnet £2.00 / Single cream 99p
Total cost - £2.99
When I headed into Lidl, the standard 400g punnets of strawberries (£2) were sold out, so I had to purchase a 600g family pack for this (£2.79) but it just goes to show they must be quite popular. The strawberries had started to look a little sad and mushy in the punnet, so I initially wasn't feeling very impressed with Lidl's offering.
However, they didn't taste as bad as they looked with a nice initial sweet hit from the fruit. They're unlikely to win any awards, but they'll do the trick. More than anything else, I was surprised to find that Lidl wasn't the cheapest offering of the bunch, with that actually coming from M&S of all places. Due to the lack of 400g punnets, buying the 600g pack and cream cost £3.78, so technically the bargain supermarket is where I spent the most money.
Score - 3/5
Tesco
Strawberries punnet £2.30 / Single cream 80p
Total cost - £3.10
Tesco is my regular go-to for groceries and I'm normally a fan of their fruit and veg, but they didn't quite manage to pull one out of the bag here. Despite having lots of strawberries in stock at my local superstore, I was disheartened to see that most of the fruit went out of date the same day or the following day, which meant it wasn't at its best.
This was very evident during the taste test as the fruit lacked sweetness and was almost a little sour in terms of taste. The cream, however, was perfectly fine, so no issues there, but a real letdown with the strawberries.
Score - 2.5/5
Sainsbury's
Strawberries punnet £2.25 / Single cream 75p
Total cost - £3
Sainsbury's was by far the standout of the bunch, with lots of ripe, shiny, juicy-looking strawberries packed into the punnet. The strawberries had a wonderfully sweet taste and paired nicely with the cream. It was just the perfect little treat, exactly what you want from the pudding.
While they're not the cheapest, they're definitely worth that extra cost and I'll almost certainly be getting these again. I didn't rate them highly enough in the taste test at first giving them a cautious 4/5 but I've decided I'm now going to be changing that to a solid 5/5 because after going back for a second try, I can say for sure that these deserve top marks.
Score: 5/5
Asda
Strawberries punnet £2 / single cream £1.20
Total cost - £3.20
After trekking across London to find an Asda store, I was stunned to discover that the supermarket didn't have any cream in stock other than the alternative option of Elmlea (£1.15). After badgering several members of staff to check I wasn't just looking in all the wrong places, it turns out they didn't even have any cans of whipped cream or creme fraiche, so I opted for a pot of Elmlea single, but reader, this was a HUGE mistake.
I must never have tried Elmlea before, because if I had, I'd have known never to buy it ever again. It's absolutely disgusting. If the colour of the stuff doesn't put you off as you pour it, the taste certainly will.
My face in the video above says it all. It left me feeling sick and ruined the perfectly fine taste of Asda's strawberries. If you can get hold of regular Asda own-brand cream in your local shop, try that instead, or buy cream from literally anywhere else, just don't make the same mistake I did.
Score - 1/5 (with the Elmlea), 3/5 for the strawberries
Marks & Spencer
Strawberries punnet £2.10 / Single cream 80p
Total cost - £2.90
These aren't just any strawberries, they're M&S strawberries... but sadly, they're also pretty disappointing strawberries. They just weren't quite ripe enough, still rather firm to cut into and not very juicy. They also didn't have much flavour to them, they pretty much tasted of nothing. And let's not even get started on the cream, which was lumpy when poured. Points were deducted accordingly.
Score - 2/5
Where do you like to get your strawberries and cream from? Let us know in the comments below.
